Mani Balamurugan

Dr. Balamurugan Mani received his Ph.D. in Chemistry (2012) from Bharathidasan University, India. His doctoral work on functional models for non-heme iron oxygenase enzymes, laying the foundation for his lifelong interest in catalysis, biomimetics, and metal-mediated organic transformations.

Following his Ph.D., Dr. Balamurugan worked as a Research Associate at the Central University of Tamil Nadu before moving to Seoul National University in 2014, where he held a series of postdoctoral positions in Prof. Ki Tae Nam’s laboratory, including Brain Korea 21 Fellowship (2015–2016). In 2020, he was appointed as ‘Assistant Research Professor’ at SNU’s Soft Foundry Institute, where he leads pioneering research on advanced catalysts for energy and environmental sustainability. He specializes in the development of advanced catalysts for energy and environmental applications, with a focus on electrocatalytic CO₂ reduction, N₂ and nitrate reduction, hydrogen and oxygen evolution, electro-organic conversions and biomass oxidation.

Dr. Balamurugan has contributed more than 35 Publications and beyond publishing, Dr. Balamurugan has played an active role in leading and securing research funding as the Principal Investigator of the National Research Foundation of Korea Project (2021–2024, ≈ 147,000 USD), focused on the electroreduction of CO₂ to C₂+ products using membrane electrode assemblies, with the aim of developing industrial-scale electrocatalysis.

Currently, Dr. Balamurugan is a Senior Researcher at Materials-Envi Lab at CEET, VSB – Technical University of Ostrava (VSB-TUO), Czech Republic, where he continues to advance the development of next-generation catalytic systems for sustainable energy and environmental technologies. His research bridges fundamental catalysis, nanomaterials design, and applied electrochemical systems, with the aim of transforming carbon dioxide and other small molecules into valuable fuels and chemicals.